Jeremy Clarkson shares fears for future as he admits farm ‘would stop breaking even’
Jeremy Clarkson has, in recent months, been highlighting the great financial peril farms and hospitality venues are facing under Labour, as the cost of running both is set to rise sharply
Jeremy Clarkson has launched fresh criticism against decisions made by the Labour government, as he admits that he is concerned about the financial future of farms across the UK, including his own Cotswolds-based Diddly Squat Farm.
Jeremy, 65, was at the forefront of campaigns to get Labour to u-turn on their inheritance tax plans for farmers.
Under the plans, Chancellor Rachel Reeves said she would levy inheritance tax on farms, sparking a flood of anger from farmers, including former Grand Tour and Top Gear presenter Jeremy.
In his latest column for The Sunday Times, he has renewed his criticism of the policy, despite the government u-turning on the changes just before Christmas that raised the threshold at which estates would be taxed.
Describing the process of one farmer handing over their land from one generation to the next, Jeremy wrote: “One day, of course, his dad will die, and if the farm is medium-sized, thanks to the Labourites, he will have to pay inheritance tax.
“And the only way he’ll be able to afford to do that is sell a portion of the farm. Which would make it completely unviable. I have a thousand acres at Diddly Squat and even a farm that big does not make money. If I had to sell a third of it to pay Rachel Reeves, it would stop breaking even and make a loss.”
It isn’t only the future of farming that Jeremy has expressed concern about; he also runs a pub called The Farmer’s Dog. Like many venues, it was set to be hit by rising business rates.
Earlier this year Jeremy admitted that his venture was running into issues. Writing in the Sunday Times, Jeremy echoed the concerns of fellow pub owner, the Michelin-starred chef Tom Kerridge, in his sadness at the situation.
He said: “The chef Tom Kerridge said the rates on his burger joint in Marlow would go up from £50,000 a year to £124,000….At my pub, the Farmer’s Dog, things aren’t quite that bleak but they’re still pretty terrible.
“The rateable value would shoot up from £27,250 to £55,000 and when you factor in the national insurance rise, which has upped our wage bill by £42,000 a year, we’d be up a gum tree.”
The lamentation follows Jeremy joining hundreds of other pub landlords in banning Labour MPs in response to the rise in business rates at the end of last year.
At the time Jeremy wrote on X: “To be clear, I have banned all Labour MPs from my pub, except one: Markus Campbell-Savours. He’s welcome any time. And not just because the Labour Party has now sacked him.”
Whether the ban has since been lifted is not yet known.